1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains to apparatus for the automated production of paint and other materials which are dispensed into a container, and with closure of the container are mixed by agitating the container.
2. Description of the Related Art
Products which are composed of several ingredients are often produced by combining ingredients in a shipping or storage container, sealing the container and then mixing the contents thereof. For example, pulverulant products such as cement mixes or liquid products such as paints and coatings are readily amenable to such production techniques. In the paint industry, for example, a can, pail or other suitable container is filled with a base material. The containers may have a five gallon or a one gallon capacity, for example. Thereafter, one or more tinting agents are injected or otherwise added to the base material.
A paint base material may be tinted at a local business establishment conveniently accessible to an end user, using materials provided by a paint manufacturer. The tinting agents and possibly other additives are added to a paint base material, and the container is then sealed and inserted into a mixing apparatus which shakes or otherwise moves the container to mix the contents thereof. It is important that the ingredients of a paint formulation be thoroughly mixed to provide a uniform color value throughout the container contents. Such mixing may be performed, for example, by bench top units or, less commonly, by floor mounted units both of which are manually operated by store personnel who insure that the container is securely clamped within the mixing apparatus, and who set the desired amount of time for a mixing operation. At the end of the mixing cycle, the operator unclamps the container from the apparatus and presents the container to the end user, with no further operations being required in most cases.
Paint is also manufactured by tinting a base material in a mass production facility. Such "factory formulations" are important, for example, when large quantities of a formulated paint are required, or when certain quality controls are required, especially for unusual paint formulations. Also, depending upon the distribution system available and other factors, additional economies of production are possible only with large-scale factory operations. United States patent application Ser. No. 432,991, filed Nov. 6, 1989, the disclosure of which is incorporated in this application as if fully set forth herein, describes a commercial scale paint production facility in which paint is dispensed in batches to achieve various advantages, such as improved quality control over the paint formulation on an individual container basis, and for reduced waste of the paint materials which are used in the course of a production run.
Further advantages are obtained in such mass production facilities since the entire operation can be fully automated. For example, the containers may be provided with bar-code indicia which contain paint formulation and other information such as the size of the container and customer information associated with an order for the paint material. In order to preserve the economies of a fully automated paint production facility, an automated mixing of the containers at a rate consistent with commercial production operations, is required.
Examples of manually operated mixing equipment are given in U.S. Pat. No. 4,134,689 and United States Design Pat. No. 254,973. In these patents a floor mounted machine is provided for receiving a container to be mixed. An operator adjusts a motor-operated clamping mechanism to insure an adequate clamping force is applied to the container. Next, the operator initiates a mixing cycle and thereafter unclamps and removes the container from the apparatus.